Professional Documents
Culture Documents
CHP 09
CHP 09
Objectives .............................................................................................................................................. 2
9.1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 2
9.2 Website Design ............................................................................................................................. 3
9.2.1 Guidelines for Developing a Website............................................................................... 3
9.2.2 Analysing Overall Site Aims ............................................................................................ 3
9.2.3 Website Architecture ........................................................................................................ 4
9.2.4 Navigation Planning ......................................................................................................... 7
9.2.5 Designing for Hyper-Reading .......................................................................................... 8
9.2.6 Estimating Download Times ............................................................................................ 9
9.3 Formats of Web Graphic Images ................................................................................................ 10
9.3.1 Main Features of the GIF Format ................................................................................... 10
9.3.2 GIF Headers ................................................................................................................... 11
9.3.3 GIF Colour Palettes ........................................................................................................ 11
9.3.4 Interlacing ...................................................................................................................... 12
9.3.5 Transparency .................................................................................................................. 12
9.4 Features of JPEG Format ............................................................................................................ 12
9.4.1 'Lossy' and 'lossless' compression techniques ................................................................ 13
9.5 Designing Website File Structure ............................................................................................... 15
9.6 Review Questions ....................................................................................................................... 16
9.6.1 Review Question 1 ......................................................................................................... 16
9.6.2 Review Question 2 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.3 Review Question 3 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.4 Review Question 4 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.5 Review Question 5 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.6 Review Question 6 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.7 Review Question 7 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.8 Review Question 8 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.9 Review Question 9 ......................................................................................................... 17
9.6.10 Review Question 10 ..................................................................................................... 17
9.6.11 Review Question 11 ..................................................................................................... 18
9.6.12 Review Question 12 ..................................................................................................... 18
9.7 Discussion and Answers ............................................................................................................. 18
9.7.1 Discussion of Activity 1: Bad Websites ........................................................................ 18
9.7.2 Discussion of Activity 5: Using GIF Files .................................................................... 18
9.7.3 Discussion of Activity 6: Image Sizes........................................................................... 20
9.7.4 Answer to Review Question 1 ........................................................................................ 20
9.7.5 Answer to Review Question 2 ........................................................................................ 20
9.7.6 Answer to Review Question 3 ........................................................................................ 21
9.7.7 Answer to Review Question 4 ........................................................................................ 21
9.7.8 Answer to Review Question 5 ........................................................................................ 21
9.7.9 Answer to Review Question 6 ........................................................................................ 21
9.7.10 Answer to Review Question 7 ...................................................................................... 21
9.7.11 Answer to Review Question 8 ...................................................................................... 21
9.7.12 Answer to Review Question 9 ...................................................................................... 21
9.7.13 Answer to Review Question 10 .................................................................................... 21
9.7.14 Answer to Review Question 11 .................................................................................... 21
9.7.15 Answer to Review Question 12 .................................................................................... 21
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Website Design
Objectives
At the end of this chapter you will:
• Understand some basic global trends in e-commerce;
• Understand basic guidelines for website design;
• Understand some of the common mistakes in website design;
9.1 Introduction
There are at least four design issues that must be addressed when developing a website for e-commerce:
The first aspect belongs to the discipline of human-computer interaction (HCI) and the second to
graphic design. This course does not cover graphic design, but will mention some of the computer
graphics technologies involved. The chapter examines elements of HCI as it applies to the Web in
order to explore how websites can be made more usable, especially for potential customers.
The fourth choice does not directly affect the user. It is concerned with the organisation of the HTML
files, the graphics files (e.g. JPG files), etc, on the server. Of course, a failure to properly organise
these components of a website can lead an inability for the site and its developers to quickly respond
to changing business priorities and circumstances.
Internet commerce has become a major part of business. A report by the International
Telecommunication Union indicates that globally, 3.2 billion people are using the Internet, of which
two billion live in developing countries1. Further, the report indicates that between 2000 and 2015,
Internet penetration has increased almost seven-fold from 6.5 to 43 per cent of the global population.
The proportion of households with Internet access at home advanced from 18 per cent in 2005 to 46
per cent in 20151. Much of the growth in web connectivity has come from mobile. Mobile broadband
penetration has gone up 12-fold since 2007 2. A 2015 study by Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC)
indicated that many countries are seeing more online shopping than ever before. It also revealed that
while behaviors vary by country, consumers around the globe share the same expectations when it
comes to online shopping — they want efficiency, convenience and enjoyment 3. The report also
indicated global online shopper behavior by country. For example, Figure 4.1 indicates the online
shopping behavior of South Africans. The survey indicates that South African residents are the most
willing to pay for same -day deliver (79%) 3. On a global scale, the products that are purchased the
most online are books, movies, music and video games. The study revealed that 63 percent of
shoppers said they prefer to purchase these items online, while 31 percent said they would rather buy
from a store4. Recognizing these trends, browsers running on personal computers are no longer
assumed to be the only means for potential customers to access a site. They are connecting via
dedicated Internet appliances, such as phones with built-in browsers, via interactive TV, via hand
held devices, etc.
1 http://www.itu.int/net/pressoffice/press_releases/2015/17.aspx#.VmEaVfkrLIV
2 http://time.com/money/3896219/internet-users-worldwide/
3 http://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/retail-consumer/global-multi-channel-consumer-
survey/survey-highlights.html
4 http://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/retail-consumer/global-multi-channel-consumer-
survey/retail-subsectors/books.html
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Figure 4.1: Online shopping behavior of South African residents (Source: PWC)
As a general rule, avoid the unnecessary use of technology. While doing so, also recognise that any
technology that has been avoided at some point in a website's lifetime may become vital to the site as the
site's needs change, or even as user interface fashion progresses. This idea of change, and the fluidity of
the guidelines, is important. Technology that is unnecessary today may be acceptable or even necessary in
a few years’ time . For example, it was once considered inadvisable to use frames or scrolling text. Now,
these are less of an issue: frames are supported by most browsers in current use, and users are used to
scrolling. (However, we will still discuss these below.)
Once the broad, high-level description of the site's purpose is known, refine the goals in more detail. Ask
yourself, "What are we trying to achieve?" and answer the question in a way that adds detail to the
description. Do not only consider the obvious questions concerning the site's purpose, but also the issues
around the implicit messages a potential customer might receive from the site. For example, if a website
selling holiday packages offers most of its packages in, say, Italy, as that is where most of the company's
customers have traditionally wanted to go, then the site might give the impression that Italy is the only
country that the company knows about. While some messages should be avoided, there might also be
positive messages that the site should given, such as those concerning the quality of the service, or how
long the company has been in business.
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Website Design
Thus, one aspect of website design is to identify primary and secondary goals for the site. The primary
goals may be achieved by directly implementing facilities to meet those goals, for example, by providing
a catalogue of goods and services. The secondary goals may be achieved in more subtle ways, by, for
example, choosing colours that suggest stability, excitement, or so on; or by providing subtle, positive
messages to the customer concerning the company running the website and the services on offer.
Let us pursue these ideas with an example. Say you are in the business of developing software on behalf
of clients, and that you also sell programming language compilers and development environments. Your
clients might choose both the programming language and a specific compiler for it. For instance, one
client might choose Java, and another might choose C++. The second of these clients may or may not
have an opinion as to whether Microsoft Visual C++ should be used in preference to IBM's VisualAge C+
+. You sell both, as well as other C++ development systems, so you can cope with the choice of either.
You have decided that the main purpose of your new Web site is to 'sell the services' of your company.
How do you determine the details of this? One method is brainstorming, in which a group of people
briefly consider all aspects of an idea. Participants in a brainstorming session are expected to contribute to
discussions, to arguments in an unstructured, anarchic, often unruly way. They will often jump from one
idea to another, calling out words, arguing for and against points — sometimes simultaneously. In
brainstorming the ideas of all the participants are initially given equal weighting, so the most lowly
employee may argue freely with the most exulted. Brainstorming is usually thought of as a fun way to
generate ideas; it is a very creative process and the outcomes can often be surprising with unexpected
benefits.
As can be seen from the previous exercise, expressing many ideas using brainstorming or a similar
technique, may result in a mixture of ideas concerning the purpose of the site and how to achieve it.
Ignore the detail of the 'how' and try to understand what it means. One suggestion of, say, using grey to
suggest reliability may contradict a suggestion of using bright colours to convey excitement and being a
'go-getting' company, but that does not matter at this stage. The important information here is that both
aspects of the company are to be conveyed. The question is whether it should be a primary or a secondary
goal.
One question concerning primary goals that the brainstorming did not settle is that of what the site is
primarily selling — software development skills or programming language implementations. The sooner
this is answered the better — but it might require debate, and the decision may, to some extent, depend on
what can be achieved in the time and budget available for site development. For example, it may be
difficult to organise the selling of programming language implementations because the website might
have to interact with a database of information about stock levels. Another reason for not promoting that
side of the business might be that the company could not cope with too much extra business of that kind.
The irrelevance of distance when selling products might increase sales of compilers and programming
environments, whereas the need for software developers to meet their clients might naturally limit take-up
if that side of the company's business was promoted.
As well as the website developers knowing what the site's purpose is, they must also know its audience.
With knowledge of your audience, you can tailor both content and presentation to suit their needs and
keep Web customers returning for more business.
Ultimately, knowledge of the business requirements and expected audience is the starting point of
understanding the site requirements and design. Knowing these facets provides a foundation for site
development. Such a foundation must be the basis for the design. It should drive the design. You must not
start with an arbitrary design and force other choices to fit it.
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Website Design
organised).
All the above points are related to each, and so it is not possible to prescribe an order in which they should
be considered. For example, the structure of the site is related to the possible paths through the site, as will
the structure of the individual pages. All should be strongly influenced by the site's purpose and target
audience. Now let us consider an abstract view of how a site is organized. Figure 4.2 shows this structure.
A structure such as Figure 4.2 is sometimes called an information architecture. The structure implies that
users start at the home page, then visit pages A1, A2, and A3; followed by visiting pages B1, etc., through
D3. This sequence of page visits, however, may not be the sequence the user chooses to view. Say the
page organisation reflected the departments of an office equipment supplier — desks, filing cabinets,
pens, paper, computers, fax machines, and the like.
Clearly, the information architecture is not devised with navigation primarily in mind. Let us briefly
consider navigation: imagine a scenario in which a user wishes to buy a computer, a combination fax /
scanner / printer, and furniture to hold these. From the home page the user might visit C, for computing
equipment, then perhaps move between pages C1 and C2 as they decided which computer and fax /
scanner / printer they want. Having bought the computer equipment, the user might want to go directly to
A1 for a desk, then A3 for a chair, and finally A2 for a monitor stand. The diagram above does not
represent this scenario or even the possible navigation paths. It only present a 'logical' view of how the
pages in the website are related to each other.
Now examine a second version of the site structure, with navigation paths added:
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Figure 4.3 Website information architecture with navigation paths
In this second version of the information architecture, explicit navigation paths have been given, each of
which is a two -way path. This is based on the assumption that a user of the site would need to move
backwards and forwards between 'sub-departments'. Notice that no navigation has been included between
departments, between A and B, C, or D. This is an arbitrary decision, which in reality would be made
knowing the site's purpose and audience. Navigation planning will be discussed further later in this
chapter.
Having come up with a plausible information structure, the structure of the individual pages need to be
designed — this is called the Web page architecture, and another design effort is required for this. This
should be done before settling on the layout and style. For example, Figure 4.4 shows two possible page
architectures for displaying the same information, namely a page of book or report style.
These structures can be implemented in different ways, inasmuch as the fonts, colours, button styles, etc.
could be varied for each. These are important facets of style, usually decided by graphic designers.
Software developers should be primarily interested in the structure of the page elements. When these have
been decided, the graphic designer's 'look and feel' can be achieved using HTML, JavaScript, and so on.
Figure 4.5 shows instances of the above page architectures. Both have the same content, but different
layouts and styles. The HTML facilities required by each is quite different. For example, it may be
convenient to use tables to implement the first layout and frames for the second (although neither have
been implemented with either tables or frames). Design is all about making choices, as can be seen here.
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Website Design
One technique for designing the navigation paths is to storyboard the tasks that the users might undertake
when visiting the site. Storyboarding is a technique taken from cinematography: the story is developed by
roughly sketching each scene — as well as the actions in each scene — on a board, and placing each
image in the desired sequence. For Web site development each page does not need to be sketch out, but
each scenario does need to be documented and analysed.
Ideally, a storyboard should be developed for all the pages in a complex website so that style can be
compared with function. As with all these design activities, the storyboard may have to change — but it is
easier to change a storyboard than the final product, and a storyboard acts as a good starting point to
website design.
Navigational aids are an important ingredient for successful website design. Browsers themselves have a
variety of navigation aids including Bookmarks (Favourites) and History lists, while the JavaScript
language has facilities to access these. A website designer can make use of these facilities, but the page
architecture should provide the navigation aids that are considered necessary.
Overcoming the 'Lost In Hyperspace' problem is a difficult problem to solve. It occurs when a user
follows a series of links and discovers that they do not know where they are in a site or how to retrace
their steps to a previous page. There has been much research into this phenomenon, but this appears to
have been ignored by Web designers.
The 'Lost in Hyperspace' problem can be prevented, or lessened, by applying three rules: in general every
page in
your website should include: where you are; where you have been; and where you can go For example,
the Middlesex University academic home page, shown below implemented two of these rules. It shows
where the user is by the down pointing double -headed arrow ( ) beside the word Academic. The other
words on that navigation bar (preceded by the symbol) show what the designers see as major
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Website Design
navigational steps to other topics. By contrast, under the 'Academic' heading there are nine links, from
Studying at Middlesex University through to ‘What's New’. The user has left the mouse pointer over
International Students, which has been highlighted by a rectangle outline. (You will study how to achieve
such an effect a later chapter).
Clearly, people adopt different reading manners between reading Web pages and books. In their 1997
study, Jakob Neilsen and John Morkes discovered that 79% of people merely scanned the text of a Web
page. They found that only 16% read every word. Other work has found that less than 20% of readers
scroll beyond the information that is visible. From these findings it could be concluded that Web pages
should:
• contain 'scannable' text, in which keywords are highlighted to aid quick perusal;
• employ meaningful sub-headings;
• use bulleted lists to provide a quick summary of the main ideas;
• use only one idea per paragraph, concentrating on the introductory words of the paragraph;
• use the 'inverted pyramid' style of writing, where the document begins with the conclusion;
• use half or less of the word count of conventional writing; and
• ensure that all the information is visible on the screen without scrolling.
Such guidance should be used were needed, but should not be relied on slavishly. It is important to
remember the intention behind the above suggestions. For example, from the third point, do not remember
it as a statement to only 'use bulleted lists', but remember that the bulleted lists are meant to summarise
information explained fully on the page. A study by Nielsen and Morkes emphasised the need for Web
designers to instill in users a sense of the site's credibility, as well as a trust in the content provider: if
readers do not believe what they read in any section of a page, they may skip the rest of the page.
Credibility and trust are important to businesses wanting to establish commerce on the Net.
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Website Design
• www.websitesthatsuck.com [http://www.websitesthatsuck.com]
• www.worstoftheWeb.com [http://www.worstoftheweb.com ]
Write down your view of these sites. Choose three of their featured websites and, for each chosen site,
identify one aspect of its design that you find particularly poor. Try to find four or five examples of bad
Web design and discuss them with colleagues on-line or in tutorial.
Take note of the main mistakes he lists and the extent to which he has changed his view. What about the
other lists? Are there any inconsistency? Write down what you think of the current advice found on these
lists.
Take note of the main mistakes he lists and the extent to which he has changed his view. What about the
other lists? Are there any inconsistency? Write down what you think of the current advice found on these
lists.
Review
Do Review Questions 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5
Factors in page download speed that are to a large extent beyond your control include:
As far as possible, decisions that affect Web page speed should take this information into account. For
example, if the website is to be used within a company as an intranet, or with limited access for registered
customers as an extranet (see Unit 13), then the configuration of the users' computer systems should be
completely known.
The main factor under a Web designer's control is the use of high-bandwidth information:
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Website Design
• Video and audio resources require the largest files; streaming technologies are offered by
companies such RealNetworks (via their 'real' media formats) and Apple (via QuickTime 4).
• Animation formats such as ShockWave (which include video and audio) require external
applications or plugins in order for a browser to view them. This requires the designer to
consider the large file sizes of the content, and interaction with external software.
• Graphics files may be large: JPEG is often used for high definition images and GIF for simpler
ones. Various strategies may be employed to reduce the number of colours contained in an
image (and hence reduce the file size, download time and the rendering time). For example, the
distracting animation used earlier can take between 2 and 8 seconds to download depending on
modem speed; this time can be reduced by half when colour reduction and other optimisations
are used. The technologies involved are discussed later in this unit.
Apart from reducing image file sizes, a number of other techniques can be used to improve the apparent
performance of a browser. For instance, browsers cache all the content that they download on the
assumption that this content may be used again. So, a graphic used on a variety of pages can be reused
from the cache rather than downloaded, as long as only a single copy of the image is used on the website.
Using multiple copies of the image will circumvent any advantage that could be obtained from the
browser's cache.
Specifying the size of the image to be displayed allows the browser to reserve the space needed for the
image while the image is downloading; in the mean time, the rest of the page can still be displayed:
Netscape Navigator also provides a LOWSRC attribute for the <IMG tag; this allows for the designer to
specify a file to load in advance of the true image. This should be a temporary, low-resolution, low colour,
small image file — essentially a place holder for while the true image is being loaded.
GIF files support any resolution (up to 65536 x 65536pixels). They provide indexed colour images
supporting 8-bit colour information (256 colours). LZW (Lempel-Zev-Welch) compression is used to
reduce file sizes. It works by compressing 'runs' of identical colour information. For example 100
contiguous red pixels in the same row take up 100 8bits, with LZW compression it is converted to 100 red
pixels that takes up 16bits. LZW is a lossless compression technique, and so the compressed image is
identical to the original image.
Although GIF met its original requirements, it does have its limitations: GIF allows a colour table of a
maximum of only 256 colours, and LZW compression is a general technique not particularly efficient at
compressing graphical images.
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Website Design
By contrast the almost indistinguishable image below has only 64 colours and a correspondingly smaller palette. A
light green has been selected, with index 58 — Red 204, Green 255, Blue 204.
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Website Design
While adaptive palettes provide greater colour detail in images, they have some problems. Each image has a palette,
which takes up extra space in a file. Furthermore, some machines can only deal with only one palette at a time,
which results in palette clash if multiple palettes are used
Fixed Palettes
Rather than creating a palette for each individual image, it is possible to use a standard palette, with the following
pros and cons:
• The advantage is that the images will be smaller as no palette need be saved with each image;
• Conversely, this is quite a restriction on the image and is only suitable for 'drawn' rather than
photographic images.
9.3.4 Interlacing
• Rather than storing the image in row order, GIF files can be stored with every 8th line at the head of
the file, followed by every 4th, and so on.
• This file layout allows a low resolution version of the image to be displayed while the file is still
downloading. As more of the file is downloaded, more detail can be displayed.
9.3.5 Transparency
With the 1989 GIF format, one colour in the colour table can be defined as transparent. This allows the background
image/colour to show through, and for graphics to appear non-rectangular. However, allowing only one colour to be
transparent can cause bad feathering effects to appear around the image's edge. For example, the world image was
originally designed to be on a white background. This becomes clear when a Web page is given a non -white
background colour, as in Figure 4.8 below. By designating white to be transparent, the background will show
through, as in Figure 4.9.
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Website Design
Figure 4.11 Enlarged versions of JPEG images with lowest and medium compressions
While lossy compression works well for photographs, line art (particularly text) blurs or 'ripples'. Because JPEG
discards information, repeatedly editing and saving JPEG files causes a progressive worsening in the image's quality
— this means that JPEG is usually only used for the final copy of the image, and not for any of the intermediate
stages.
LZW compression
LZW compression, as used in the GIF format, builds a dictionary of common data sequences found in the image. It
then replaces these sequences in the image with a short dictionary code. The dictionary need not be transmitted with
the data, as it can be easily reconstructed. The algorithm is simple, and the technique is used in various file formats
(not only graphic file formats), such as TIFF, DoubleSpace, Stacker, GZIP, ZIP and ARC. LZW is patented, but
payments to the owners need only be made by those implementing the algorithm, not those using it. LZW
compression works best on images with large, 'flat' areas of colour, as in cartoons, and drawings, rather than
photographs.
JPEG Compression
After applying the transformation to the colour table, the data is then compressed using traditional techniques.
The most common of these is Huffman encoding, which works as follows:
Sites like these will invite you to select a GIF file on your computer hard disk or to select a GIF via an URL. The
uploaded GIF is then compressed using their tool. All you have to do then is wait for the results! If you want a GIF
on your disk for experimentation, save any GIF file from the many available on the Internet, or you can save and use
this image below.
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Website Design
Review
Check your progress by doing Review Questions 9, 10, 11 and 12
How would you implement this structure on a Web server? The most obvious way might be to locate the files
related to individual pages in their own directories — one directory for the home page components, one for pages
A1, A2, A3, B1, and so on. However, this may be excessive and lead to relative addressing mistakes. More
importantly, such a design does not anticipate change. If the information architecture reflects departments of a
business — department A, department B, etc. — then changes within the departments could cause a large
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Website Design
maintenance overhead. A preferable structure might have directories for the main departments only:
The folder for Department A would contain all the files for A1, A2 and A3 — both the HTML and image files
(and maybe even the JavaScript files, QuickTime files, etc.). With this structure a link from A1 to A3 might occur
as follows:
On the other hand, a link from A1 to C2 would have to include a relative file path, as in:
Answers can be found at the end of the Chapter in Discussions and Answers.
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Website Design
Answers can be found at the end of the Chapter in Discussions and Answers.
Answers can be found at the end of the Chapter in Discussions and Answers.
Answers can be found at the end of the Chapter in Discussions and Answers.
Answers can be found at the end of the Chapter in Discussions and Answers.
Answers can be found at the end of the Chapter in Discussions and Answers.
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Website Design
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Website Design
32 Colours; 20 dither; 26.3% (2.2 secs.)saving 16 Colours; 30 dither; 41.6% (3.4 secs.)saving
8 Colours; 40 dither; 51.7% (4.7 secs.)saving 8 Colours; 50 dither; 75.6% (6.3 secs.)saving
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Website Design
2 Colours; 60 dither; 85.7% (7.1 secs.)saving 2 Colours; 80 dither; 84.7% (7.0 secs.)saving
You can experiment with JPEG files yourself using a graphics application or a website that offers the facility, such
as JPEGCruncher [http://www.spinwave.com/crunchers.html]
• choosing any graphic images you might need, and the appropriate technology;
• devising the directory and file structures that will allow you develop and maintain a site.
• website Architecture.
• Navigation Planning.
• Site Promotion.
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